The Annals 



of 





Scottish Natural History 



No. 69] 19 9 [January 



ON THE OCCURRENCE OF EVERSMANN'S 

 WARBLER {PHYLLOSCOPUS BOREALIS 

 (Blasius)) at fair ISLE: AN ADDITION 

 TO THE BRITISH FAUNA. 



By Wm. Eagle Clarke, F.R.S.E., F.L.S. 



On the 28th of September last, while in search of migra- 

 tory birds at Fair Isle, I put up from a patch of potatoes, 

 where it was hiding, a dark-coloured Willow Warbler, which 

 I at once suspected belonged to some species I had never 

 before seen in life. I was fortunate enough to secure the 

 bird, and congratulated myself, as I contemplated its out- 

 stretched wings each with a conspicuous single bar and its 

 well-defined, pale, superciliary stripe, on the capture of the 

 third British example of the Greenish Willow Warbler 

 {^Ph. viridamis). 



On my return to Edinburgh, however, I was agreeably 



surprised to find that my bird was undoubtedly an example 



of Eversmann's Warbler (^PJi. borealis) — a bird which had 



not hitherto been detected in Britain. The descriptions 



• ' of this species are misleading, far too much importance 



$• being made of the so-called double wing-bar. The second bar 



— - is absent in some examples, while in others it is only present 



- in the shape of a few flecks of greyish-white on the tips of 



ex. 6q b 



